Forensic Genomics Group, Institute of Legal Medicine (MUI)
MUI’s work in CapCell starts and ends with end users. Drawing on its active role within the network of forensic institutes, MUI identifies which challenges in sexual assault casework warrant a single-cell approach and feeds emerging CapCell solutions directly back to practitioners through targeted training. This continuous feedback loop supports the development of a modular toolkit that is not only innovative and robust, but user-friendly and ready for adoption.
Leveraging its practical role as a national forensic service provider and forensic database and tool developer (e.g. EMPOP, STRidER), MUI leads WP6 and oversees project validation activities. Particular emphasis is placed on rigorously testing long-read and massively parallel sequencing assays for male nucleated single cells using increasingly complex and realistic samples.
Finally, MUI closes the end-user-driven feedback loop by curating active scientific dissemination of all CapCell developments to the wider forensic scientific and practitioner community.
I am Associate Professor at the Institute of Legal Medicine, Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria, and Adjunct Professor at Penn State University, USA. I supervise the High Through-put DNA Database Laboratory and lead the Forensic Genomics group. I am a former President and current Secretary of the International Society for Forensic Genetics, represent Austria in ENFSI and EDNAP, serve as Editor-in-Chief of Forensic Science International: Genetics, and am an elected member of the Leopoldina.
I hold a master’s degree in translational biomedical research (IMIM programme), completed at Uppsala and Groningen Universities. My research experience in forensic genetics includes studying SNPs for human appearance trait prediction (Erasmus MC, The Netherlands; NCB, Kazakhstan) and mRNA-based body fluid identification in the context of sexual assault cases (Eurofins, The Netherlands). I also bring science communication skills developed through my work at the SaaS company BioRender.
